You Know How It Is

Bare Beaten

Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

It’s the Barebones 300 this weekend. I arrived at Llanbrynmair a couple of hours ago. Got parked up. Ate some food and packed the stuff that I’m going to be riding with. It’s pretty breezy at the moment, raining a little bit. Forecast for tomorrow is rain, hopefully clearing up for Sunday.

Looks like it might stop raining tomorrow afternoon, which means riding through Saturday night will, hopefully, be dry. As normal feeling apprehensive and unprepared for the ride ahead.

Actually that’s no different to any other year, you know, not feeling fit enough. Not being prepared enough. Weather not perfect enough. Storm Amy rolled in last night or was it tonight, brilliant timing. Anyway, we’ll give it a shot.

I have done a few of these, so I kind of know what to expect. I know I’m going to have some low points, I’m going to have some high points. It’s comforting to know that it will end. And in reality, it is only a short period of time. No matter how uncomfortable it’s going to be feeling.

I seem to have everything I need, except I left my 2 water bottles at work. I left them right by the door so I couldn’t forget them.

Strategy wise, I need to get to Knighton, which is 100km in, before 8 o’clock. That’s when the co-op shuts. That’s going to be my main refuel. So I’ve got food to get me there.

I don’t pack super light, but I don’t pack heavy either, I’m not fast enough to race. I just need to get round in 36 hours. So, steady all the way. I tend to aim for 10 kilometres every hour if possible, which gives six hours to play with.

That can soon disappear, whether that’s a snooze, or allowing for some segments that may take longer, such as hiker bike sections. And yes there will be a lot of those.

I’m going to be wearing the clothing I went for last year, which was 45nrth boots, waterproof boots that are no longer waterproof, but I know they’re comfortable. On top I’m going to, I think, wear my Alpkit Jura fleece fibre pile instead of a waterproof. It’s probably too hot for most people, but I don’t like to get cold. I can undo the zips for venting, and if it’s wet and windy I want something that I know I can just wrap up in, and it’s gonna get me through. I kind of go for reliability.

I’ve done enough of these to know how cold I get, and I’d rather go slower and more comfortable than faster and lighter, which I just know I haven’t got the fitness for.

Another thing, that really helps during the night section is decent lights. Previously, years I’ve had my Revo dynamo light, which is fine on the roads, but as soon as you go off-road, or push your bike uphill very slowly it doesn’t provide much light. So I back that up with a light on my helmet. Last year, mine conked out, so I’ve got a new one. I’ve got the Alpkit Kula this year. It mounts securely with a single cable tie and it will be super bright. I’ve also backed up the Revo with another high powered Alpkit Hadron light and battery pack on my bars. It just makes those night sections faster, safer, and the more light you got, the more comfortable you feel.

I am back on my Sonder Broken Road single speed. Last year I was on the Pinion Broken Road which I enjoyed, well, as much as can enjoy the Barebones. So, Back on the single speed. It’s fine. Done it before slow and steady. Expecting lots of pushing. Hope we get a bit of sunshine. Just want to be in a a good place after the first 100 K. Refuel. Easy through the night. Maybe a snooze. The last couple of years I’ve had to take a snooze around, ooh, I think, 160 kilometres, maybe I pushed it a bit more last year, maybe it was 170km. It would be nice to get through to 200.

I think only once have I gone right through and that was tough. I slowed right down to a crawl. Even just taking an hour’s nap does refresh you. It does help push you on.

The wind is picking up again. It has stopped raining though.

The rain has started again. It always sounds worst in a metal box.

7 o’clock depart. Looking forward to the meal at the end. It’s important to have something to look forward to.

Saturday

I am done. Major route finding error. Using my Wahoo Roam for the first time. Did I even turn up? Legs tired. Windy. Big hills. Singlespeed wrong choice, always the wrong choice. 30 hours to go. Dark, it gets so dark. Hungry, haven’t drunk enough.

And so ended another Barebones 300. Just 2 hours in, sharp thoughts shooting through my head like crazed bubbles on a brainstorming diagram.

As I stood in the petrol station forecourt in Llanidloes trying to work out what had gone wrong.

Slowly the bubbles started to connect.

I was following the orange line, which was fine, until I got into a town where there were lots of orange lines. I had been following the road, I hadn’t turned on follow route.

Zooming out I could see where I should be. I was 20k off route.

I was feeling like I expected to feel after about 100k. That’s when those mid journey doubts surface. I know if I ignore them for long enough they will go away. The long night will be over and the sun will rise again.

But not today, I am a long way from that point. No drive.

I plot my next move, I really don’t want to head into the headwind along the road. Too hilly, long climbs, exhausting.

So I head back along some B roads towards the Hafren forest. I recognise it, of course I do the Barebones and Welsh Ride Thing have passed through here countless times. I imagine a multiverse in which I can see my self criss-crossing this terrain over the years, and various times of the day and night in various states of fatigue. A quick break at the Hafren Forest car park to take on food. The rain gets heavier but I have shelter now. It passes.

Back on to the road, route 8 on the Sustrans cycle network and a lovely ride. Turns out this was the outward leg of the BB200. No sneaking back unnoticed for me, but it didn’t matter. I had made peace with myself now, I was over it. What a great bunch of people BBers are – everyone giving a little nod or wave to say ‘everything ok?’.

Getting back to the point where I should have turned off I stood for 5 minutes thinking.. 30 minutes downhill and its all over, or another 34 hours of you know what….

I threw in the towel, this year I just didn’t have the fight.

Well done everyone who started, and especially everyone still out there. It felt gustier than the storm of 2018, and that rain (hail at times) was colder. I can’t speak of the river crossings but anyone who finishes will have earned their badges and some. What a fantastic event.

Keeping My Head Above Water

Fri, 15 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Swimming for me has never been for fun, it’s been a battle for survival.

I learnt to swim as a kid, but I guess I did the bare minimum to get my certificates. I even got a photo of me sitting next to the British Olympian David Wilkie.

Clearly there was more that I needed to do if swimming was to feature in my future, which I didn’t, so it wasn’t.

I don’t float I tell people. I sink.

Now that’s a real confidence blow, a weight on the mind if you like. A reason to stay in the safety of the shallows or attach yourself to the magnetic reassurance of the poolside.

This isn’t to dismiss watersports. I like floating around on the water; canoeing, paddleboarding, kayaking all get a big tick from me. But in these sports the buoyancy comes from the toys.

I don’t float I tell myself, I have got to keep moving but this comes at a cost. High energy expenditure, short breathing, constant awareness of how deep the water is, nervoulsy monitoring how far to the nearest bank takes it toll.

Everyone can float is what I read on the internet. Boy that just makes it worst. Just relax is what swimming friends say. I AM relaxed I glug back.

No I haven’t done anything to debunk my ingrained belief. I haven’t sought out the advice of a swimming coach or joined a club. I have done nothing because swimming just wasn’t fun.

I have thought for the longest time that swimming just isn’t for me, but a couple of recent experiences have made me reconsider.

The first was in Anglesey this summer. I was fooling around in the bay, fully clad in a wetsuit as I always am when confronting water in the wild.

This year it felt different, there were warm patches in the shallow water that felt, dare I say comfortable. After I had fulfilled my duties of paddling the kids around in the canoe I grabbed the full face snorkel and proceeded to scope the bay.

Never getting out of my depth, head down I swam parallel to the shore. I could see the sandy sea bed clearly, right down to the ripples in the sand. I saw a couple beady eyed crabs scuttle away as I floated over them. Yes I was floating.

As I got closer to some rocks I was met by seaweed suspended vertically from the ocean floor, swaying in the gentle tide. It was beautiful, a million miles away from the creepy mess that washes up on the beach. It was like something out of a natural history programme, was I enjoying this?

The second time was in the public bath. Can you believe the non swimmer had been designated swim tutor, a task I had been dutifully carrying out weekly for some months with a break over the winter.

We were getting somewhere. Luca had discovered he could put his head under the water and it was still there when he came back up. The key was accepting goggles.

Our swimming sessions became as much about exploring the underwater world as it was trying to propel ourselves across the surface.

I was also taking full advantage of what ever floatation devices came my way, and as Luca was becoming more confident I could float up and down the pool just finding my own space.

It slowly dawned on me that instead of fighting my body to do something it clearly didn’t want to do, a small amount of additional buoyancy was completely transforming my experience in the water.

I could float without expending energy, I could breathe easy, I was relaxed.

Now my time alternated between floating on the surface, nattering away without a care in the world and diving under, enjoying the experience of swimming underwater. I challenged myself to see how long I could go without touching the bottom.

I caught myself rethinking the activity of swimming. I had always seen swimming as either lane swimming or free chaos. But I was enjoying something different, the shear pleasure of weightlessness, of suspension in the liquid medium.

Wouldn’t it be great, I thought, if I could go to a pool and just float around. No one would frown at me if I chose to wear a wetsuit or a buoyancy aid and there were no lanes, no balls flying over my head and I could just paddle around with a snorkel.

There would be activities to keep me interested of course, floating platforms I could swim around, arches for me to swim under, tunnels I could swim through and objects to explore underwater. Yes that’s it a water exploration park.

I was liking this. Bubble columns and foam kelp gardens to swim through, caves to swim into, irregular shaped pools, areas of light and dark, still water and moving water.

My vision, no doubt a health and safety nightmare. As a climber I can see parallels with the kickback to indoor climbing . Why do you need to turn something that exists in real life into something artificial and indoors?

Is all of this just a distraction, am I just fooling myself and trying to avoid the hard work of learning to float?

Autumn Run

Thu, 14 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Yellow orange a few leaves on the floor

Yellow orange falling down

Yellow orange crunch

Easy run today

Easy run, easy breathing

Time standing still, passing Chatsworth

Looping round onto the Monsal Trail

Back onto the White Peak Trail

Not gonna overdo it, just listen

Just breathe and then a steaming bowl

Of apple crumble with double cream

When I get home, home, treat myself

Running through the golf course

Running into Bakewell town

Running, always running on

Trail washed away

Trail slippery, rocks beneath

Trail enters Bakewell just above

Just above the station there

Loop down, over trail

Right turn, straight through the station

Back up under the old bridge

Like threading a needle through

Threading through onto Monsal Trail

Onto the trail again

Towards Darley Dale now

Now the rain is falling still

Still raining, still running

Still moving through the puddles

Stop for a bit, puddles building

Building up along the trail

The trail runs out towards the end

A blocked off tunnel, shoot off right

Back left under the old bridge

Cross country piece of trail, that’ll take me up

Up where I started from

From Rowsley hit the White Peak trail

Follow the train track back down

Back down to Darley Dale again

Back down, back down again

This Monsal trail, so important

So important during lockdown days

We used to come

All the time with the buggy running

Pushing Luca along the path

With Harry and Ami running

Running alongside us always

Honestly, without that trail

Without that trail I’m not sure

What we would have done

To keep ourselves sane

Stretch now

Tired legs at the top

Back at the top of the hill

Overlooking Derwent Valley

Down to Rowsley in the distance

Still raining, always raining

Apparently there’s an Alsatian

On the loose somewhere near

Just past the blackest mushrooms

Darkest mushrooms I’ve ever seen

Blackest, darkest mushrooms growing

Under a hawthorn bush they stand

Tall stems and dark black heads

And lines and little bunches

Shiny tops under the rain

Light glinting off them strangely

Dark, dark black or dark brown

Amazing mushrooms in the rain

Yellow orange a few leaves falling

Still raining on the trail

Still running through the valley

Still

Trick Or Treat

Mon, 04 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The candles have been extinguished, the pumpkins look more sad than spooky. Another Halloween has been and gone.

When I was little we didn’t get passing zombies, our house was off the beaten path, they never made it far enough along our road.

Trick or treat, Halloween is a festival that’s leaves me cold. I am not big on fancy dress and I don’t like the expectation of treats on demand.

I drop into survival mode and wait around at work until the ghouls have departed. I avoid the mobs and get to see the stragglers working their way home, weighed down by their bounty.

To be fair some kids really put the effort in, some parents too, and that’s a joy. But others of an awkward age just use it as an excuse to kick something up in someone’s garden. This disrespect of property bugs me.

Pulling in to our drive I was both surprised and impressed to see we had made a cardboard sweets dispenser. This ingenious mechanism limited how many treats each group of zombies could take.

Unfortunately some kid helped himself to the torch that lit it up. A ghastly affair.

A Conversation Around Transport Options

Mon, 02 Sep 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Are you ready?

Not yet you’ll see, so forgive me I’m just stuck in the seat.

Let’s talk about the traffic show, it essentially talks about the traffic.

Okay, wait two minutes okay. Wait a minute let me just look at the map. Okay, let’s talk about the traffic.

It says there are lots of cars.

Yeah, what can we do?

We need to sort it out, maybe you can when you’re bigger.

You can sort it out now, you tell me what you’re going to do.

You give me a good idea and I will give you a good idea.

Okay, I’ll give you a good idea. We can push the car out of the way.

It is actually a good idea. Okay. I have another idea. We can make the cars smaller. Is that a good idea?

What did you say?

I said we can make cars smaller. Make cars smaller, then we’ll have more space on the road.

That’s a good idea what else can we do?

We could make the roads bigger. Is that a good idea?

I don’t think that’s a good idea. Because then we’ll have to cut down more trees. That’s a bad idea. What else can we do? Have you got any ideas?

Okay, we can make cars fly, that could be a good idea, give them wings to fly. Yeah, we’ll give them some buttons.

Yeah, they definitely need buttons to fly. And what colour should we make them?

Should we make them all red?

Okay, we’ll make red flying cars.

That’s a good idea, isn’t it?

Right can you think of more good ideas?

Do you have a good idea?

We can give everybody bikes, if we gave everybody bikes then there will be less cars on the road.

I don’t know. I think people don’t like getting wet or exercising. We could make bikes with roofs so people don’t get wet.

What else can we do?

We could make more trains. Everybody could go on the train instead of in their cars. Is that a good idea? Oh we can make trains that carry cars. You could drive onto a train and then the traIn would take your car to wherever you’re going. And we would sit in the car.

What did you say?

I said we could put the cars on the train. It just seemed like a good idea. Right look, I can’t hear you when you’re making that noise. I’ve got another idea. We could have special buses that go to everybody’s house and take you wherever you want to go that’s a good idea. And maybe, maybe they don’t have any roofs so you get a really good view of where you’re going. Yeah.

No thanks. More ideas.

Okay. We could have special taxis. That you phone up. You say ”I want a taxi” and a special taxi comes to your house. It’s a little bit like a ski lift. The doors open, you just jump in and it carries you via cable cars all the way across the traffic to where you’re going.

That’s a good idea. Isn’t that many ideas?

We’re doing lots of ideas today. Okay, well here’s a good idea. We could have really clever lights that told you when to stop and go, telling you how to avoid all the traffic jams.

More things.

Okay. Here’s a good idea. We could all start working at different time. Or schools can start working at different times. So that not everybody does the same thing at the same time.

And.

We car, Oh shared cars. So there would be less cars on the road because we’d all be sharing and you’re just paid to someone excuse me where you go. And they might say ”Oh, I’m going to London”. ”Oh, I want to go to London too, can we share the car?” and then instead of two cars going to London, there would just be one car going to London.

That sounds like a good idea and more things.

I’m trying to think of all the things you haven’t had many ideas yet.

…

Okay, I’ve got an idea if we lived by a river. If we lived on the river, we could use a boat instead of a car. Like a river taxi that’s a good idea isn’t it?

Taxi Yes. I think that’s a very good idea.

Say that again, what was your idea? You have got to speak louder because I can’t hear anything.

…

That’s better. We’re going to Newcastle… Newcastle.

Managed By The Kids

Tue, 27 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Driving to work today Luca politely asked if I could put something in my calendar to remind him to check his dinosaur egg later that day.

I was being managed.

Coffee Fix

Sat, 03 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Firing up the coffee machine has become a daily ritual in our household over the past few years. It was purchased to save us money on buying coffees out and about.

We are not coffee nerds, but I have grown attached to a milky, cappuccino-esque coffee in the morning.

Disaster struck a month ago when the machine refused to perform plunging us into a coffee crisis.

Rummaging through the kitchen cupboards an old mocha was dusted off and quickly rejected for having no rubber seal. A small cafetière finally surfaced from the camping box and we had time to gather our thoughts.

Whilst not a major investment, it was still quite an expensive item, an object with moving parts, and who isn’t aware that we should be repairing rather than rejecting and buying new.

When we bought the machine, a De’Longhi Dedica Style in case you are interested, we were impressed by the number of spare parts available. It was part of our purchasing decision. But this problem looked like it needed someone with a few more spanners in the toolbox.

De’Longhi have a service centre on their website where they promise to collect and repair your coffee machine for a one-off payment. We just needed to call a number and have our serial number handy.

So that’s what we did. 1 week later at a cost of £50 and the machine is back in the kitchen pumping out the coffee rather than sitting in landfill.

Of The Adventure Is Over

Sun, 12 May 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Of the adventure is over

The body recovers but the kit lays

Muddy, dirty, covered in sweat and smell

There is no gutter away

Wash and begone

Kids Eat For Free

Mon, 18 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

A few weeks ago, I visited a pizza restaurant in Edinburgh. It was close to the hotel I was staying in. I was lured in by an offer on their website that indicated kids eat for £1.

The meal was fine, we enjoyed it, and the service was good. The kid was entertained, and I polished off what he couldn't finish. Obviously, this didn't include the ice cream, which he finished off with space to spare.

When I came to pay, the waiter told me that the offer did not apply to all restaurants in the chain, so I had to pay full whack.

Despite my good experience, I felt cheated. I paid the bill and stepped away, but the sour taste has been bugging me.

I was keen to understand this more. Was I acting rationally to have these feelings?

I went looking to behavioural insights for some answers:

Expectation and Reality Mismatch: I had an expectation based on the advertised offer, and when the reality didn't match, it led to disappointment and a sense of being misled.
Perceived Injustice: Being charged full price when I expected a discount felt unfair, particularly as I believed the offer was misrepresented.
Impact on Trust: The incident eroded trust in the restaurant's advertising, perhaps stretching to the brand as a whole.
Cognitive Dissonance: Fancy term. My positive experience with the food and service conflicted with the negative experience of the payment issue.
Emotional Response: Emotions like anger and feeling cheated are responses to situations where we feel we have been treated unfairly, deceived or put on the spot.

So, my reaction was rationally irrational. Expectations set by the restaurant's advertisement were not met. This triggered feelings of injustice and a breach of trust. The old Amygdala kicks in, and emotions are heightened.

So I am good; I didn't make a scene, and I haven't left a negative TrustPilot review. But I am still not going back, so I win.

Old Lego

Sun, 03 Sep 2023 00:00:00 +0000

How wonderful it feels to be able to put together a Lego toy 40 years after it was last touched.

I remember playing with Lego as a child, but I don't recall it ever being on my 'I want, I want...' list at Christmas.

Other toys delivered more immediate rewards. Star Wars, Action Force, Evel Knievel, toys that were action-ready straight out of the box.

Nevertheless, the Lego did get a look in and I amassed a fair-sized collection of bricks.

At some point, I stopped playing with it. I am not sure when, but sometime after, there must have been a decisive action to box it up and archive it somewhere in the house.

Thankfully - and I only appreciate this now - it wasn't thrown out.

So that was that. Life continued on as it sat, immobile, out of mind and frozen in time.

At some point, when I got my own house, we became reunited. And once again it sat, immobile, out of mind and frozen in time.

Somehow, this box had evaded cull after cull of old toys and possessions. Perhaps it commanded some mystical power over all who were entrusted with it.

'Keep me, keep me, just in case'.

Until, finally, its day had come. A new generation had appeared with small fingers, as yet unimpressed with fad or fashion and ready to build his own world.

And what do you know? It still works as perfectly as it did all those years ago.

It still rewards imaginative play, develops creativity and provides an environment of innovation through small iterative accomplishments.

It also adapts to the child and his interests, whether it's cars this month, dinosaurs next month or monster trucks every second Wednesday of the month- it just gets taken apart and built again with greater and greater complexity.

Not only that, it is 100% compatible with the Lego on sale today. And boy hasn't it evolved. If you still think Lego is just for kids look again.

The house now has a variety of Lego-inspired accessories such as iPhone and laptop stands.

There is a risk that tomorrow they will be pillaged for parts in a space rocket, but I don't mind that, as long as I get to play.

If only more things in life were designed to be less obsolescent and more Lego.

Indomitable

Tue, 22 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The year is 50 BC. Gaul is entirely occupied by the Romans. Well, not entirely…

Roll back to my early teenage years in Cambridge where Saturday lunchtimes meant a sortie to the public lending library. My hunt was laser like and specific.

The Asterix books were always lined up along the large window overlooking Lion Yard. Tintin was also there, but it wasn’t Tintin I was after.

Every few weeks a new title would appear. Those were good days. I would get the book stamped, in the bag and devoured within the day.

Each tale would take me on a journey to a far away land. Frequently outnumbered, the heroic duo of Asterix and Obelix would come to support the misfortunes of some underdog, usually at the expense of the long suffering Julius Caesar and his battered centurions.

Packed full of funny puns, petty internal squabbling, with just their wits, cunning and the not inconsequential power of Getafix’s magic potion to help them; each story would culminate with the village reuniting under a moonlit banquet.

After reading each story a few times I would copy the drawings. I was no comic artist but I tried anyway. I marvelled at the dedication and patience it would take to fill a book.

As I made my way though the series it became increasingly difficult to find new titles.

Today it would be considered inconvenient to make a 40 minute trip into town with no guarantee of finding what you want, having to wait and delay the gratification.

40 years on and this is no longer a problem.

I now have my own hardback collection sitting on the bookshelf ready to thumb at a moments notice.

I have revisited the stories of these indomitable Gauls. The tales are as enjoyable as ever but the typesetting is a lot smaller than I remember.

Dadventuring

Sun, 18 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Sunday morning, but not any old Sunday. Father’s Day! Permission granted to slumber.

My slumbering isn’t so deep that I am not aware of the birdsong tweeting into the house. The windows left open to let in the cool air of the night.

It is Father’s Day again. Only this year is different, dad isn’t here.

“Daddy come here” the tweets are disrupted by a small voice from the bathroom. My feet roll out of bed, reluctantly followed by the rest of my body. I feel like a cartoon, my head stuck on the pillow as my body stretches through to the bathroom.

Task complete. “Daddy can I watch something” - meaning Spider-Man which is the hot new discovery. I remember watching Spider-Man cartoons when I was small. “Of course” I reply.

So I am back in Cambridge. It is hot and there is still a lot to sort, but that’s not for this weekend.

The house is still full of memories, good memories and it is comfortable to be here with my family.

Boxes of maps, books of munros, rucksacks of outdoor gear, photos of mountains and nature.

My adventuring started with dad. He would take us outdoors, whether it was train spotting, birdwatching, hiking or climbing in the mountains.

He was there on our first canoeing adventures, he was there on our first mountain camping epics.

Together we held up tent poles against storms, we got lost in clouds, drenched by rains and beaten by winds.

For a while the paths we trod were the same. He kept us safe as we learned.

But he was learning to. Although I didn’t know that at the time, dads know everything right?

Well I know it now.

“Daaaddy, can I have breakfast?”

Wait, aren’t I supposed to get that in bed this morning?

My Siri Personal Assistant

Sat, 15 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

“Hey Siri, what am I doing tomorrow?”

“Hey Siri, remind me to put the bins out, oh, and then book that swimming lesson.“

“Hey Siri, ….”

It’s not always easy to tell when Science Fiction is reality.

We quickly get habitualized to technological innovation, to the point of taking it for granted.

Is it too far-fetched to expect Siri to be able to execute a few simple, on-the-go requests in aid of making my life better?

My Personal Assistant Siri; she is always with me, the ideal candidate in many ways.

She literally exists in the internet, knows everything about me, knows who I know and the tools I use to organise my life.

Except she doesn’t.

Siri is dumb, capable of carrying out a few scripted tasks, but insight and communication are not amongst them.

As I sit here barking orders at Siri, a conversation with my personal assistant is just Science Friction.

Gagagubbby

Tue, 12 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Gagagubby, what is Gagagubby? I am not even sure that is how you spell it. It could be Gaagaagubby, or maybe Gahgahgubby. It is a word that does not want to exist on paper.

There are a lot of things we don't know in life and this is just another one of those things. You won’t see it, you can’t see it as it resides in a world we cannot touch, the imagination of a 3 year old.

I can’t be sure that the person who invented Gagagubby knows what it is, although I have to admit it appears to be a very useful and flexible word indeed.

We create in our imagination, loads of crazy things that we don't know, don't understand and can’t explain.

Gagagubby was brought alive finding his place in the world. Each day a workshop for experimentation, triggers and ideas, a playful process devoid of risk. He gives it a name because he can share it with us.

Our imagination is so powerful it is hard to communicate its ideas. Who’s failure is that?

Despite my best efforts I have failed to reverse engineer its meaning. I have tried to use it myself in conversation but invariably I am met with a stern ‘No’. Gagagubby has remained as elusive as the great Yeti.

And now it’s footprint is fading, I can’t even say if it will survive as a fully fledged memory. That makes me a little sad, so I have bound it, if not by definition, unwillingly to this page.

As frustrating as it is I love that we will never know what Gagagubby was, and that for a short period of time it was meaningful for at least one small person.

No Train no Gain

Wed, 08 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The guy sitting next to me is snoozing, his book Claudius the God lays untouched on the flip down table in front of him. I love those Penguin classic covers. Out of the window a very green Mam Tor glides by. My gaze traces that ridge line which I have ridden now many times in many weathers. I capture these thoughts in front of me, and acknowledge to myself that this is something I value.

As a very proud Alpkit co-founder part of my role is getting out and about around the country to visit the team in our superb stores. This currently extends north to south from Edinburgh to Kingston and east to west from Gateshead to Betws-y-coed. Fortunately I live somewhere in the middle.

Anyone into the outdoors is acutely aware of the climate crisis. We know quite often the activities we love have a negative impact either getting to or being in the nice places we want to be. Cars loaded with kayaks, trail erosion from cycling or walking, destroying mountain habitat with ski centres, the list goes on.

While we have been burying our heads in the sand over the climate crisis Covid presented an immediate problem we had to deal with quickly. Painfully it has provided an opportunity for a reset. It has shown we can make great change happen. So as I have been getting out more regularly to visit Alpkit stores I have been trying hard to change my default behaviours.

I am trying to make this work with the train, and on the whole it is going as well as I could expect.

It is taking effort. The car is a habit and I perceived it as convenient. It sits patiently outside the house and I can fall into it at any time of day, crank the engine and roll onto the motorway with little planning. The more i explore this convenience the more I question what I accepted was convenient about the car. In all honesty I hadn’t really questioned what I thought was convenient about it.

Let’s just take today as an example. Right now the convenient choice would have seen me in the car, sitting in traffic trying to get around Manchester, looking at industrial buildings and listening to Boris,s latest exploits on the radio. 7 hours of driving later I would flop fatigued back into the house. No lingering view of Mam Tor, no productivity, no article, no cheeky coffee and croissant at the station and limited interaction with the world.

It’s not going to be the easy choice, I have just noticed Trainline sent me an email last night informing me that one of my return trains has been cancelled (shame there wasn’t a push notification via the Trainline app). If the world has shown us anything over past couple of years it is that we need to be resilient and adaptable. Is it too early for my cheese sandwich?

Frisk masking film

Wed, 16 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

It wasn't enough to have drawn the damn thing in the first place, you then had to go over it again with a surgical scalpel and cut out masks. Once the masks were cut out, then and only then, could you start laying down the colour with the airbrush.

A mask, is a stencil. Banksy uses them all of the time to create his art. The benefit for him is that they reduce the amount of time he has to hang around looking anonymous. That wasn't a particular issue I had, but spray on its own does produce blurry edges and that was a problem for precise engineering illustrations or fancy chrome lettering.

So we buy this masking film on the roll (Frisk brand incase you were wondering). It comes attached to a backing paper from which you peel it off, being very careful to avoid it sticking to you or itself. Easy enough for small details but a handful for large areas.

Once removed from the backing paper the next step was to lay it flat over the artwork and apply it without introducing creases or air bubbles. There were always air bubbles.

You then meticulously cut the mask out of the film using a scalpel, being careful not to push too hard. Cogs and meshing teeth were particularly tedious.

This film has a slightly tacky side so that it didn't get blown to the other side of the studio when you point the airbrush at it. Also it wasn't supposed to remove your paint when you pulled it off, but it did. This really hurt when it destroyed a lovely smooth gradient.

There would be no choice but to find your original mask, you kept it right?.. and do it again. Each time building up layer upon layer of paint, making it increasingly difficult to work with.

Times were changing though, Photoshop, Cmd Z and layers were just around the corner.

Iwata airbrush

Sun, 06 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The airbrush was the thing that got me interested in technical illustration. It had it all, a shiny little gun in the shape of a pen which when connected to an air compressor would fire out a fine spray of colour.

If you had a dual action airbrush - and I did - you could control the rate of paint flow by a little trigger on top of the airbrush. There was also a whole world of different nozzles and paint reservoirs to choose from. It didn't end there for you also had air compressors to consider. Wow a little machine sat in my bedroom squashing air, and delivering it through a flexible hose to my finger tip. It even had a moisture trap.

Through this collaboration of engineering and hand-eye coordination photorealistic illustrations were made possible. If you are thinking reflective chrome metal, clear glass, smooth plastic surfaces and smooth skin gradients - yeah that's the stuff.

My tutor was Tom Liddell, one of the best in the field. Man he could spray. I always enjoyed my time with Tom, he was gently spoken, down to earth and understanding when things went wrong. And they did, often.

But despite the glossy exterior the reality was a right pain. The airbrush would frequently get clogged up with paint and had to be cleaned when you wanted to change colour.

The compressor would start up alarmingly just as you were adding a delicate highlight or shadow. Chug chug chug.

But the thing that drove me to desperation was the masking - more on that in a later post.

The compressor has long gone but I still have the Iwata, still shiny and safe in its little box.

Magic Markers

Sat, 15 Jan 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Tools of my trade part 1

These were a real gem of a find. Marker pens really came of age in the graphic and design studios of the 80s. They were a key visualisation tool and any graphic studio worth their salt wouldn't be complete without a full set of these stubby little glass bottles.

Their advantage over other rendering techniques was that they allowed you to work fast to get ideas out of your head, through your hand and onto paper in a form that represented form, volume, speed, texture.

For this reason they were ideally suited for product and automotive concept renderings. In the right hands and with the right choice of papers you could blend colours and produce illustrations that approached the photographic realism of the airbrush. I used to pour over work by the likes of Dick Powell.

These stubby glass bottles refused to conform to any ideas of ergonomic styling that current markers now follow, but fitted snuggly between your thumb and forefinger. They stood up proud and ready for action on your desk rather than rolling around. The name was great, the shape was great and you could refill them with solvent when they ran dry.

With these little bottles of colour you could render the future.

Tools of my Trade

Mon, 20 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

A recent visit from my parents brought with it a load of goodies from the past, a box full of my old illustration tools.

There is something important about tools, whether it is in the pursuit of creative work or just bashing down a wall.

It is no exaggeration to describe tools as extensions of our limbs. Indeed much of the satisfaction of using a tool does come from sensory and tactile feedback, and when a tool delivers high quality results - sometimes even under an unskilled hand, the results can be truly emotional.

A tool rarely lives in isolation either, it is part of a family all with their own little specialisms and quite often has a home, like a tool box or rack where it sits merrily in its place until it is called upon.

With these back in my life I thought it would be fun to write a series of homages to the tools of my trade.

Tales from the river bank

Thu, 07 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The river flows day and night. From high to low it makes its way through here and there, doing this and that.

Sometimes a trickle, sometimes a torrent. The river rises and collects extra passengers. Unwanted passengers like farm waste, agricultural plastic wrap, bales of hay. Things we have discarded like plastic bottles, road cones, aluminium cans and glass bottles. Things discharged from our water treatment works like sanitary towels and wipes.

Quite often you're not, you're just not aware of rubbish along the rivers. It silently floats past and into the distance and out of sight. Sometimes.

Look closer, it's trapped. Below your feet, when you're standing on the riverbank you probably can't see it. Cast your eyes to the other side, see it now?

Filtered out by the branches that hang low over the water, that provide habitat for the animals that live along there.

You see you really have to get in the river to clear it. And that's not easy. Often overgrown, muddy, slippery. Inaccessible due to the branches. Low, low hanging trees. Fast moving current.

It takes a fair amount of commitment, because it's a fast flowing river. Cold in the winter, windy. Yes, and wet.

It is challenging to know what to do in the midst of an environmental crisis. It keeps coming at you day and night.

Start small, start local. Start with things you know. Look at your own patch and look after it. Whether it's your local footpath, your local woods, or your local watercourse.

Set an example for other people. People see what you're doing, they might join in. People join in. You create a community of like minded people, your community becomes a movement. Just because you have done something.

Suddenly your tale is making an impact.